Katie Fforde - Going Dutch

‘Good God no! Not at my age! But we did try to have another after Karen, in fact Karen took about five years to turn up. We – well, maybe it was just me – really wanted another baby. Now Philip's going to have one. He was a very good father,' she added.

Dora found herself unbearably saddened at Jo's plight. The longed-for baby was going to Philip, who was the one in the wrong. It did seem that his bad behaviour was being rewarded, while Jo's good manners were doing her no good at all. They sat in silence for a while and then Dora said, 'Did you mean it when you said you were definitely going to Holland?’

Jo took a deep breath and released it again. 'Oh, I think I'd better now, don't you?'

‘Yes!' said Dora, punching the air in a restrained way. 'Then I will too! Tom will be so pleased!'

‘Do you want to please Tom, Dora?' Jo looked at her questioningly.

‘Well, sort of, but it's mainly because it would be a challenge. Tom thinks I'm awfully pathetic.'

‘He can't think you're pathetic now. You've got racing tips and done karaoke.'

‘Those dares are different. Going to Holland on the barge would be a real challenge, don't you think?'

‘Deffo,' said Jo and Dora laughed.

Jo awoke the following morning with a sense of doom so deep she had to check that no one had died. The moment she was properly awake she realised why: her ex-husband was going to be a father again and she had committed herself to going on a trip that genuinely terrified her. She got up, determined to clamber out of this Slough of Despond before anyone noticed she was in one. Her strange, personal ladder was to cook an old-fashioned Sunday lunch. It involved soothing, familiar tasks and the stress at the end always gave way to a sense of triumph. She needed to feel in control again.

Dora, unaware of Jo's different priorities, was intent on planning the trip to Holland.

‘So, where are we all going to sleep?' she asked. 'If Marcus has your cabin – are you sure you have to give it to him?’

‘Yes,' said Jo, who was peeling carrots. 'He has to be near the action, and it's quiet and comfortable.'

‘OK, then you must have my double cabin, I'll have the single, but where will Tom go? On the sofa?'

‘He could, but I'm not keen. I suppose we should clear out the glory hole.' She bit her lip at the prospect. She had managed to more or less ignore this space since she'd moved on to the boat, apart from the few ghastly times when its door had been opened during the parade of boats, and didn't really want to attack it now, when she had so many other things on her mind.

‘But where would we put all the stuff?' Dora asked. 'If it's Michael's, we can hardly throw it away. If only boats had attics. I don't think we saw a single barge with attic space, although they had everything else.’

Jo smiled in spite of her preoccupations. 'I'll email Michael and ask him. Really,' she went on, sounding less amused, 'I hate to sound ungrateful, but if Michael had lent me a country cottage he wouldn't have been able to ask me to move it, or with it.'

‘No, but he could have asked you to have the dry rot seen to, or some such. That would have been much worse.'

‘True.' Jo wondered if she should confide her terror to Dora but decided not to. 'But this trip to Holland is causing us both a lot of work.'

‘But it's going to be such fun!' Dora insisted, trying to conjure up some enthusiasm for them both. 'Tom was so thrilled when I rang him about it last night. He's coming over later to see how the plans are going.'

‘He's coming to check that I haven't chickened out, more likely,' said Jo. 'But if he's coming, he can help us shift stuff. His reward is Sunday lunch.'

‘I'll ring him. Why don't you email Michael and ask if we can chuck his rubbish?’

Jo regarded her young friend with her head on one side. 'I don't remember you being this bossy when you were a little girl, Dora.'

‘I've grown up a lot since then,' said Dora, 'and I learnt a lot from Karen.' She frowned. 'I think the real reason was that I let my mother make all those wedding arrange ments, and I never argued with her once. She chose the style of dress, the flowers, what sort of a reception we should have, everything. This was her day, I thought, John and I have the rest of our lives. Then I realised that I didn't want the rest of my life with John, and that I musttake control a bit.' She grinned. 'Which was why I ran away to live with you. A surrogate mother cooking Sunday lunch!’

Jo laughed. 'Except there seems to have been a bit of role reversal,' she said. 'Go and ring Tom. I'll try emailing Michael.’

Dora went up on deck, where the reception was better, to do this. She reflected what a really good friend Tom was. He not only made her have a lot of fun but he was really supportive, sort of like an older brother. Of course, Dora reminded herself, she didn't want anything else from him – that would make things far too complicated.

As Jo had declined help with peeling the potatoes, Dora decided to tidy her cabin, which hadn't had much attention since she'd started her job. She stowed away the bits and pieces that she had bought yesterday, wondering what would happen between her and Tom if either of them did want a relationship. He was a normal, healthy male, he was bound to want a girlfriend sooner or later. He wouldn't want Dora hanging around then.

A bag of woolly socks that she had last worn at school got filed neatly in the waste-paper basket. Her mother had made her take them, convinced that boats were all freezing cold, even in summer. She must be on the alert. If she got any hint from Tom that he fancied anyone else, she must make it clear that it was fine by her – she just wanted to enjoy being single for a while.

Jo came to her door. 'Michael was on-line, luckily, and he says we can throw away anything we like as long as Marcus doesn't think it might be useful.'

‘For goodness' sake! How are we expected to second-guess what Marcus will think! I wish I'd met him,' Dora added. 'It would make it much easier.’

Jo laughed. 'I expect we'll be able to tell if there's anything we might need to keep. Michael says we can put things we're not sure of in the forepeak.'

‘What's that?' asked Dora, horrified.

‘It's a tiny little cabin up the front end. It's a vertical glory hole. Instead of stuffing things in, you just drop them down. Like an oubliette, only for clutter, not people. There's stuff that's been there since before Michael bought the boat, I'm sure.'

‘You know what Karen would say..

‘And what you're going to say..

‘We should clear out the forepeak as well, and then we've got it if Marcus needs to bring anyone else along.’

Jo sighed. 'Let's consult with Tom, and I'll cook lunch.'

‘You're just trying to get out of clearing out the forepeak!'

‘You've got it, sweetheart, but I took a lovely joint out of the freezer yesterday. I thought I might need to cook a proper roast today.' Aware that her strategy was working and she was now feeling a lot more cheerful, Jo con gratulated herself on her foresight.

Dora, who had finally picked up the fact that Jo was doing a roast dinner for therapeutic reasons, hoped it would include Yorkshire pudding, even if it was lamb.

Tom joined Dora when she was standing in the corridor of the barge, surrounded by bits of plywood, old life jackets, several rusted navigation lights that could have come off the Queen Mary, piles of rope and tins of patent rust remover.

‘Hi!' she said. 'You're just in time to tell me how much of this we can chuck and how much is useful.’

He looked at the heaps around her feet. 'Well, I wouldn't actually chuck anything, just sell it on eBay.'